Most wireless communications is based upon allowing an operational band of the electromagnetic spectrum into at least two physical channels. Typically, an access point or command center for the wireless network will operate a radio transceiver in that band at one of the physical channels. In some applications the access point may operate two radio transceivers, each transceiver operating in one of the physical channels of the transceiver's operational band. By way of example, some contemporary access points operate one transceiver at a 2.4 GHz band and a second transceiver at a 5 GHz band, with the transceivers communicating on separate, often unrelated channels within their respective bands.
Channel interference is the damage caused by background signals in a physical channel that interfere with the communications between an access point and its stations, which is a problem for all wireless communication schemes. Particularly with the IEEE 802.11 communications standards and the evolution of other wireless communications standards such as Bluetooth, the channel interference can change over time. While these communications standards include provisions for selecting a physical channel when an access point starts up, as the channel interference and bandwidth requirements for the access point change, what was initially a good choice for the operating channel may turn out to no longer be adequate. Methods and apparatus are needed to recalculate the channel capacities, and if needed, change the channel to improve network performance.